As part of our celebration of Engineer’s Week, the Cincinnati Section is sponsoring a family activity on Saturday, February 24 in which you and your child will build and program a LEGO robot, and optionally participate in a friendly competition. It is sure to be great fun and a way to inspire your child.

In 2006, the Cincinnati Section purchased twelve LEGO robot kits to help with K-12 educational activities. The Executive Committee thought it would be a nice idea to let the members and their families play with the robots. Because of that desire, we invite you and your child to attend a robot workshop on February 24, 2007 at the College of Applied Science.

During the morning session, you will build a robot per predefined plans, and then with a very cool, easy to learn, drop-and-drag language, and step-by-step instructions, you will program the robot to move and respond to sensors. After lunch, you have an opportunity to be creative. You will have about two hours to modify your robot (program and structure) and prepare it for a friendly competition that involves pushing soda pop cans around. The workshop runs from 8:30 to about 3:30. If you cannot stay the whole day, it is okay to attend just the morning session.

The LEGO kits state that the age appropriateness is 10 and older; however, this activity has been successful with 8-year-olds. Teenagers like it too. Since, you, the engineer, will be present to help, and since you know your child, we will leave it up to you. Warning: the parts are very small and present a chocking hazard for toddlers.

Attendance is limited to twelve families. Reservations are via email and taken on a first-come-first-served basis. Please contact Brian Resnick (Brian.Resnick@IEEE.org) to register.

The event will be held on the campus of The College of Applied Science.

Bradley M Kuhn, the Chief Technology Officer of the Software Freedom Law Center, will give a talk entitled, “Software Freedom, Digital Restriction, and the Age of the Personal Terabyte.” He will discuss the conflicts between Open Source/Free Software and the protections provided by patents and copyrights at the College of Engineering on February 28 at 6:00pm. This event is hosted by the Student Branch of IEEE.